"Will rack densities go beyond 5kW?” That was one of the questions posed in the Datacenter Dynamics Magazine Issue #1, published back in February 2015.

Eight and a half years later, we know the answer to that question, but there have been plenty more issues to explore in the 48 other magazines that came between that first publication and the 50th issue we’re bringing you today.

To tell the truth, Issue #1 wasn’t the start of the story. DCD’s publication history goes back more than 20 years, to the foundation of the company at the turn of the century.

From 2008 to 2014, there were 38 issues of DCD Focus magazine, and DCD produced a series of newsletters and other publications from the start, supporting its events and building a community of data center professionals.

The cornerstone of the publication from the beginning has been concise and analytical news coverage, combined with longer articles that explain and explore the deeper issues in the sector.

Continuing stories

Our first issue covered a protest in Virginia, against new powerlines demanded by an AWS data center, alongside a piece about a 15-story facility in Hong Kong.

We also covered Telx’s refit of two iconic New York buildings - 60 Hudson Street and 32 Avenue of the Americas. We’ve visited those buildings multiple times since then, following other owners and tenants since Digital Realty bought Telx later in 2015.

Among the features in that first issue, we speculated that open source would drive changes in the IT provision within data centers.

Some of our other thoughts have not aged all that well. We examined a new idea, hyperscale data centers, and wondered whether they could possibly deliver better energy efficiency than the existing colocation facilities.

In the following years, we visited as many sites as possible - preferably where data centers were deep underground or in striking refurbished buildings, or serving pioneering scientific research.

We found out as much as we could about every significant part of the sector - as regular supplements have given us a chance to drive deep into topics including cooling and power.

And we reached back into the past. We found a trove of beautiful photographs from the early years of mainframes, and spoke to a team reconstructing EDSAC, the first programmable computer. This issue we continue that thread with the story of the surprising role that the Enron financial disaster played in the development of data centers and the Internet.

The last three years dealt us some of the biggest changes in the magazine’s history. When the Covid-19 pandemic struck, DCD’s face-to-face events were all canceled or postponed indefinitely. The company executed a pivot to online events and communications, and the magazine took a central role in that.

Around the same time, we hit pause on print. The magazine went PDF-only. This made distribution simpler to a readership who were suddenly absent from their offices and working from home - and wanting the communication we could provide.

It also unlocked the page limits we’d previously worked within. From now on, articles could be as long as the subject demanded.

Both moves were a success.

Readership increased, and so did our value and recognition in the industry. We now have more journalists, with their own individual beats, so you can look forward to deeper coverage of all subjects.

That has only been made possible with support from our readers, to whom we are forever indebted.

And as to that question we started with. We predicted power densities would stay below 5kW per rack until 2020. I think you know how well that one turned out.

Stay with us for future magazines as we explore where the industry goes next.

All 50 issues are available to download and read for free now. Subscribe to read the next 50.